Present drive provides remoted seniors at Pilsen heart Christmas presents to assist fight loneliness. ‘This makes me really feel liked.’

In contrast to most days, 84-year-old Cruz Mendoza awoke shiny and early on Dec. 18 to iron his plaid shirt and polish his sombrero and sneakers to put on to the Christmas luncheon within the foyer of his senior housing facility, Casa Maravilla in Pilsen.

He spends most weekends alone and that’s one thing he’s used to, he stated. However on holidays, the solitude — with which he has made peace — turns into loneliness and nostalgia for the times when he was surrounded by hugs and laughs from his household.

“This makes me really feel liked,” Mendoza stated in Spanish as he walked out carrying a blue bag stuffed with presents from a group reward drive. It’s the first time he has gotten presents in a long time, he stated smiling.

When the pandemic hit, Cristina Puzio realized that it was not simply COVID-19 that was killing older adults, it was additionally loneliness and despair, she stated. So for Christmas 2020, she invited group members to donate presents for seniors in Pilsen as a option to brighten their vacation. It’s now a convention that greater than 200 older adults in senior housing obtain presents and spend a day with one another and group members, listening to Christmas melodies and consuming a standard meal.

For Mendoza, who has lived alone at Casa Maravilla for almost 12 years, the occasion was particular. “Might God bless all of them in order that we are able to spend extra time like this collectively,” he stated.

Greater than 50% of the residents on the facility reside alone and most of them are likely to spend holidays by themselves, stated Ricardo Enriquez, director on the senior heart. Casa Maravilla is a facility for low-income seniors within the neighborhood directed by The Resurrection Undertaking, a neighborhood, nonprofit group growth company.

To see the seniors smiling is refreshing. “Issues like this remind them that they’re not really on their lonesome and motivates them to maintain going,” Enriquez stated.

Although a lot of them have households, few go to the seniors all year long. For a lot of, the reward they get from the group is the one current they’ll get for the vacations.

In accordance with a latest examine, many older adults are socially remoted or lonely — or each — in ways in which put their well being in danger. Practically 1 / 4 of People age 65 and older who reside in group settings are socially remoted, that means they’ve few social relationships or rare social contact.

Although it’s arduous to measure exactly, robust proof means that, for older adults, social isolation and loneliness are related to an elevated probability of early loss of life, dementia, coronary heart illness and extra, in keeping with the 2020 report by the AARP Basis and the Nationwide Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medication.

Maria Teresa Llanito, 77, has skilled that loneliness since her associate of greater than 40 years died three years in the past.

“Christmas made me really feel blissful, however since my husband died, I haven’t been in a position to assimilate,” she stated as she ate a tamal. “I take into consideration him each second of daily.”

The luncheon, although, helps her to “overlook in regards to the ache for a short time.”

She sat subsequent to her good friend Cirila Mosso, 67, who opened her reward little by little. There have been socks, snow globes, a pack of tortillas and even ornaments to embellish their tree. The ladies smiled and rocked to a melody on their chair. For the second, Mosso forgot why she doesn’t like the vacations: Her mom handed away in Mexico and she or he by no means bought to see her once more.

“That’s the disappointment that invades my life,” Mosso stated in Spanish.

On Thanksgiving, Christmas and Mom’s Day, her coronary heart shrinks slightly extra. “I’m reminded of her after I see different individuals with their households,” Mosso stated. She has lived on the facility for 5 years. She’s spent some Christmas days at native church buildings and different occasions, on Christmas Eve, she gathered with different seniors in her constructing to eat dinner.

By the reward drive, Puzio, an vitality therapeutic practitioner within the neighborhood, desires to assist the seniors know they’re liked and appreciated, and to encourage them to create a household with these round them.

Now, with assist from the Pilsen Satellite tv for pc Senior Heart at Casa Maravilla, the Affiliation of Latin American College students, El Paseo Neighborhood Backyard and the Women Scouts of Better Chicago and Northwest Indiana, Puzio hopes that the efforts are expanded and mirrored in different nursing properties, rehab facilities and even particular person households by way of the Chicago space.

The organizations fill the reward baggage with gadgets donated by group members. However past donations of cash or materials objects, the very best reward for seniors is time, thoughtfulness and giving them some firm, Puzio stated.

Through the holidays, consideration is usually geared towards youngsters and lots of organizations maintain toy drives, however older adults are sometimes forgotten, Puzio stated.

The pandemic helped flip a number of the consideration to the vulnerability of seniors, she stated. “We regularly assume that seniors have household, however the actuality is that a lot of them don’t, or they solely have chosen household,” Puzio stated. Many Latino older adults are additionally low-income, and a few are undocumented. For these causes, even fewer can afford to correctly rejoice the vacation.

Many seniors cry after they get their reward, Puzio stated. “They get emotional and they’re shocked that we care, that we’re doing this,” she stated.

Puzio stated she hopes that different people and organizations notice the significance of bringing consideration and assets to seniors who reside alone. It’d simply save their life, she stated.

“Spiritually, individuals wish to join, really feel seen, really feel heard,” Puzio stated. “Like they’re part of a household or that they’ve somebody who might be there for them.”

larodriguez@chicagotribune.com